Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church of Asheville

History

The first Greek Orthodox Christians began arriving in Asheville around 1900, with the first known Greek to settle in the city being Demosthenes Psychoyios, who opened a restaurant on Pack Square in downtown Asheville. Known to his neighbors as Psychas and later as Barbathimo, he was followed by Peter and Stavroula Chakales, the first Greek family to settle in western North Carolina. Peter opened the Athens Cafe also on Pack Square, which became a hub for Greek businesses including candy makers, a hat shop, and other establishments. More families followed through the first two decades of the twentieth century, among them the Karambelis, Gianakos, Mimidis, and Papadeas families, drawn to Asheville's mountain setting and the commercial opportunities of a growing mountain city.

By 1922, coincidentally the same year in which the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America was formally established, the Greek immigrants of Asheville organized the Holy Trinity community, the oldest Greek Orthodox community in the State of North Carolina. Without a church building of their own, the faithful held services wherever space could be found. The First Baptist Church and Trinity Episcopal Church offered rooms for visiting clergy, and between visits the women of the community gathered in homes to sing the Paraklesis. Baptisms were performed in homes using galvanized washtubs as improvised fonts. By the early 1930s the community rented space on the upper floor of a commercial building, the first Greek Orthodox gathering space in Asheville that could be called a church in any practical sense. Peter Chakales became the first president of AHEPA Chapter No. 28 in 1923, a parallel institution strengthening the community's civic and social foundations.

By the 1950s the community had grown sufficiently to pursue a permanent church building. Property was purchased, and groundbreaking took place on September 22, 1957, with the completed church opening in 1958. The parish's first full-time priest, Father Nicolaos Spirakis, arrived in 1959, and under his tenure the community established its first GOYA chapter and sent its first parishioners to Saint Basil Academy. In later decades the church was renovated to add a dome and extend the narthex, giving the building a more distinctly Byzantine appearance befitting its Orthodox identity. In 2022 the parish celebrated its centennial with a gala honoring the founding generation's faith and sacrifice, the congregation now more than 150 families strong and including immigrants, first and second-generation Greek Americans, converts, and Orthodox Christians of Jordanian and Ukrainian backgrounds.

Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church serves the Orthodox Christian faithful of western North Carolina as a parish of the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Atlanta within the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, the oldest Greek Orthodox community in North Carolina, bringing the Apostolic Christian faith to the Blue Ridge Mountains for more than a century.